Kurosawa simply brandishes us with the grandeur sets, glossy golden coating of each scene, contradicting behaviour and the whole Kurosawa’s package seen in many other excellent movies of his. Yet, it does not beat me over “Yojimbo” and “Sanjuro” which are the two best samurai movies I have ever seen, especially “Sanjuro”. Nevertheless this is a patiently built and constructed film about betrayal, power, hatred, vengeance and irony of justice.Everything we want to know about the four characters is in the dining session after the hunting. The great Lord Hidetora (Tatsuya Nakadai) of the Ichimonji clan is being pecked by his two subordinates Lord Ayabe (Jun Tazaki) and Lord Fujimaki (Hitoshi Ueki) asking Hidetora’s son to be married to their respective daughter. As the question looms the jester Kyoami (Peter) is asked to entertain the crowd in which he makes the comment about a hare. The son Saburo (Daisuke Ryu) who is the target of the two lords makes a sarcastic statement on them opportunistically looking for a chance to be bound to the great lord. For this statement we see Fujimaki smiling but Ayabe insulted. Saburo’s elder brothers Taro (Akira Terao) and Jiro (Jinpachi Nezu) resent him for that and even assumes or modifies the sleeping of Hidetora as a pretension to avoid the awkward situation Saburo has posed. As they leave, Saburo goes cuts off two branches of a plant and places it as a shade for his sleeping father. Taro and Jiro are the sweet talking impostors, Saburo with a blunt talk but a devoted heart and both lords, the opportunists. But mainly Hidetora, the sleeping and aged monster whom we know as the story unfolds is the walking zombie carrying his past painted with blood. Every one remains to their character till the end, no remorse but pure violence, hatred everything taking place in the name of loyalty and enmity.
The men are ruthless and brought up as so, and the difference in many is the honesty and integrity to speak up among the heads. Saburo whose words are taunting and the reason for his opinions crumbled and stamped upon is to hurt the ego of his father. He is ruthless in that too. A little reasonable talk and great listening skills for Hidetora would have avoided loss of lives, time and peace. Hidetora retires after years of killing to acquire and maintain the kingdom over the plains to his elder son Taro. Taro’s wife Lady Kaede (Mieke Harada) is a dangerous dame who has her reason to operate the mindless Taro to go against his father. Hidetora in his glory years of bloodshed and conquest in achieving the castles burned and banished Kaede’s family. This is the day she has been waiting for to avenge her family. She never gives up and becomes a lady of no empathy and filled with hatred willing to roll up heads and cross boundaries into the laps of her brother in law for vengeance. But at the same time we see Lady Sué (Yoshiko Miyazaki) a devoted second daughter in law to Hidetora who truly can make him go into his knees and despise himself to bring to face her. She is another victim of the sins of power Hidetora accumulated over the years.
Hidetora pays for those and lives the life in exile, witness his sons he trusted come after him, shamefully lays helpless even not able to find a sword to commit royal suicide and goes mad. His ego strong as the wall guards him from his regrets to break open. Even the sarcastic and pricking speeches of his jester does not wake him up from the doom he has jailed in his mind. This is his way of punishment but little does he know hell waits in his last minute in this earth.
The attack of the castle and the terror of lives being lost is a shot to be remembered for the excellence in cinema but more than that a snapshot of our continuing history towards the bleak future. A family and a kingdom kill each other in the name of wealth, power and hatred who never take the time to analyze the situation for once. As the plots and subplots sprout up, there is always one character in each of those voicing his/her heart without any shame or fear and he/she is ignored or killed to shove away the possibility of it even in the mouths of them.
A camera work even the coming generation would envy or dare to recreate the vast green plains, the monumental mountain encompassing the little soldiers and the wide angle shots of the hundreds and thousands of humans coloured in red, orange and blue running wildly in the midst of it. They are all embodied in the natural realms of this earth yet fail to notice its existence for pleasure than to shed blood. It is great work of art and it is a living proof of how Akira Kurosawa revolutionized, innovated and invented the films and his love for it.
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